I was in Montreal with the puppet-head band in 1997 and I walked into a music shop and there it was: a beautiful Swiss upright bass with nice action and a beautiful sound and that fit perfectly. You guitar players who make a big deal out of the mythical guitar/woman connection know nothing about the perfect feel of an upright bass that fits your body (because you play upright bass with your whole body) just so.

It sounded deep but defined, probably because it was relatively small, which was very important to me because the size of my hands makes playing bass at all, particularly upright, kind of a ridiculous proposition. But this one I could handle and get around on beautifully - after two minutes, I was playing stuff I'd never been able to do before. And it was actually deeper and louder than the (I say this with all due affection) big hunk of crap I played then and still struggle with today.

With the Canadian tax, but minus the favorable exchange rate, it would've run me $3200 - at the time, every cent I had in the bank. I also would've had to make a separate trip back up to Montreal to bring it home, because there was no room in our van.

But what the hell was I worried about? I was a young, single man. I had no child. I had no ex-wife. So I would've had to eat beans and rice for a half a year or so. Like I'd never done that before or since. What did I end up spending that $3200 on that was so important? I dunno. It's not really that much for a nice upright, and have I ever had $3200 in the bank since? No freaking way.

A good upright is forever. I always knew that, but now I know that in a visceral sense that I didn't have 10 years ago.

Sigh(lence).

Not quite the scenario you describe, mod, but close:

i had a Sunn Colisseum 300 bass head that was to DIE for: 300 watts, a built-in compressor that was SO GOOD i could use it for recording purposes (and the good people at Sunn knew it: they installed VERY CLEAN sounding effects in / out jacks in the back so that the head could be used for outboard purposes), a 6 band eq w/ parametric sweeps on the mid-range NOBS (not those chincy stereo eq fader-type things that you pull up and down...these nobs were made of heavy duty steel...to turn them was smoooooth....like turning the steering wheel on a Cadillac), and a gain / master volume combination that provided everything from an Entwistle-esque growl to the deepest Fender P tone you can imagine. This thing made ANY cabinet sound good.

It was stolen out of the trunk of my car while it was parked on 12 and south. that same day, it appeared with a 300 dollar price tag at the pawn shop on 12th and bainbridge. I was too young to handle this gracefully, and in my rage, I managed to have the pawn shop owner pull a gun on me and did nothing but anger the cops who should've helped me.

my heart still breaks when i think about that head.

now i bow mine in silence....

Consider this response a moment of silence for each of you.

I shared this before on the old list, so I'll make this version brief:

In, what, 1980, I guess, I made the drive (wih my parents, of course) over to Johannesburg to buy my first guitar. I was on a strict budget -- $350 or something, no more and no less. I found a new Washburn Eagle for $325. I also found a 1959 Stratocaster for $450.

My father was proud of me for staying within my budget. I still own that Washburn, by the way.

A moment of silence, please.

This thread is so depressing...plus you got me all excited with the photo of the Princeton Recording Amp. I want one of those...